


Tonight

by Augustus



Series: Interludes [2]
Category: Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace
Genre: Angst, M/M, Pre-Slash, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2000-05-23
Updated: 2000-05-23
Packaged: 2018-03-07 07:06:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 685
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3165851
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Augustus/pseuds/Augustus





	Tonight

I really hate those humbling moments. Those times when you are forced to see the world and your place in it in all their true daylight hues. Those are the times when your eyes burn from the piercing light of the sun and perhaps for another reason you do not want to admit. And suddenly your hopes seem nothing but the insane thoughts of the fool you truly are. And this destruction of your very basis for living hurts more than you would ever have believed possible. It tears you inside, rips apart every isolated strand of fantasy, and folds you into deathly despair. And all of a sudden, you're completely empty.

I had one of those moments this evening.

I used to love it when my fellow padawans would gush about how much desire they held for my master. I would get a strange pleasure from the vicarious pride such words brought. I thought happily that I possessed something esteemed by my peers. 

Possessed? How great a fool was I? A man cannot be possessed, and even if it were possible, I would never hold any rights over Qui-Gon. He is my master, my teacher, my friend - and nothing more. No matter what my mind whispers at night, that is the truth. The unchangeable truth.

Tonight I saw him talking to a padawan barely older than myself. She touched him with a hand that spoke of all the ownership I craved. And he responded with a smile that was nearly a laugh. Something snapped inside me; one part of me telling me to look the other way, a stronger part forcing me to watch the scene unfold. They left the room together. I tried to convince myself that it was purely coincidence that they were travelling in the same direction, but I had heard the padawan whispering girlishly when my master and I had passed by her group of friends in the temple corridors. Previously I had found her attentions to my master amusing. Now, they somehow didn't seem anywhere neat as funny.

I can just hear what Yoda would say if he could read my thoughts: "Jealousy leads to fear, fear leads to anger, anger leads to the dark side". How is jealousy a worse sin than any other common to the various races? Sometimes I feel as though the Jedi are expected to be infallible - and that it is the Jedi themselves who hold the highest expectations of all. Tonight is one of those times. Tonight I wish I could go back to the normal life I never really knew, just so I could, for once, be allowed to _feel_ rather than to push my emotions aside, beneath a façade of Jedi calm. Of course, in leaving behind this life, I would also be leaving _him_ and that is something I could never do. Even though being his padawan will never truly be enough for me, the mere thought of losing that one link to the man I love more than anything else in the universe is enough to make me feel physically ill. I can bear losing him at night to the more successful of his padawan groupies. It would be another thing altogether to lose him entirely.

There is a noise in the other room. It appears the padawan bimbo was not as successful in her attempt at snagging my master as I had originally thought.

"Master?" I call, to let him know that I am here.

"It is just me, Padawan," is his only response.

Oh to have him return to our rooms as my lover, pulling me to him and embracing me possessively. Instead, he is silent now, awarding me the privacy I have never asked for, never wished for. I want to go to him, to claim him, but I could never do so. He will never smile at me like he smiled at her tonight, except, perhaps, for in my dreams. I can only join him now as his apprentice and his student, and be glad that I have that much - at least for tonight.

****

~fin~


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